CONTAINERISED imports to the United States grew by 4.1 per cent in the month of January at 1.5 million TEU, a 11 per cent increase month over month from December attributed to furniture and auto sales surge.
During the month imports increased for the third consecutive month due to car part shipments up 19 per cent at around 56,600 TEU and home sales furniture at 167,300 TEU up six per cent, according to PIERS.
Menswear imports declined by 10 per cent in January against footwear growth of four per cent, according to Piers data figures.
During the month of February imports from Asia and China were up 2.9 per cent and two per cent respectively. But the meagre increase of 2.5 per cent forecast in US imports from Asia during the whole of 2012 is stark against those imports from Mexico in January at 68 per cent increase alone.
Import cargo is expected to increase by 10 per cent to 1.2 million TEU in March year on year across the US ports followed by Global Port Tracker, according to National Retail Federation it follows a slow month in February.
February is predictably a slow month reaching 1.1 million TEU, a decline of 4.2 per cent year on year. The month reported declines for west coast ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach of 5.3 per cent and 15.2 per cent respectively.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
THE Middle East Dredging Company will sign a US$1.2 billion contract this week with the Steering Committee of the New Doha Port Project for the dredging and construction of the 15-metre deep access channel into the port, according to the Qatar News Agency.
Earlier this year, the first construction contract for the project was awarded to the China Harbour Engineering Company, who will be responsible for the construction of the port basin and inner breakwaters.
The port, in the region of Mesaieed, will be completed in three phases; the first phase will provide the port with an initial capacity of two million TEU from 2014. The second phase will not begin until 2020, while the third and final phase will commence in 2030.
Once completed New Doha Port, at a cost of $7 billion, will have a total cargo-handling capacity of six million TEU and will span 26.5 square kilometres adjacent to Doha city.
Plans are also in place to link the facility with the New Doha International Airport, according to project manager Nabil al-Buainain.
Master planning for the port is being done Royal Haskoning, with the Scott Wilson Group and Worley Parsons responsible for the its overall design.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
STEEP increases in freight rates and surcharges by shipping lines on key trade lanes are forcing Vietnamese exporters to suffer profit loss, reports VietNamNet Bridge news agency.
As of March 1 container rates will increase by more than US$500 per TEU in freight for those containers to the Middle East, an increase of $400 more from April 1. Rates for freight to America will increase by $300 per TEU from March 15 and $400 per TEU from May 1.
Hapag-Lloyd has raised its shipping fees for routes to South America by $600 per TEU and routes to Panama and Caribbean by $560 per TEU and $800 per FEU. Hong Kong's OOCL will increase its rates $600 per TEU on its routes from Vietnam to North European and Mediterranean countries along with CMA CGM, Maersk and NYK increasing rates by $800 per TEU to $1,000 per TEU.
Crippling freight rates are biting into profits for exporters of fresh fish companies like Hung Vuong Seafood Company already paying as much as $10,400 in additional costs for 13 containers of its frozen tar fish products shipped to Europe, America and South America on a monthly volume of 500 TEU.
This works out as a shocking $800 to $1,000 per container in fees which adds to per kilo costs for the tra fish products, said its general director Duong Ngoc Minh, the news agency reported.
Port fees on services and surcharges are up, accounting for 70 per cent of a sum for one garment business with more costs loaded on trailer transit from port to factory from March 10 at VND200,000 (US$9.60) to VND300,000 per trailer.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
ONE of the world's largest package delivery companies, TNT Express, has launched in Hong Kong two 3.5-tonne electric delivery vehicles, making the company the first player in the territory's express market to have electric vehicles in operation with "zero emission" as the most significant feature of the electric cars.
"As a good corporate citizen, TNT is working together with customers, suppliers and subcontracts to continuously improve our overall CO2 efficiency to fight against climate change," said TNT China express chief Peter Langley. "We are proud to play a leading role in spearheading electric vehicles in Hong Kong."
TNT's current project is being supported by the Pilot Green Transport Fund under the Hong Kong Government's Environmental Protection Department (EPD).
"We applaud the Hong Kong Government's Environmental Protection Department (EPD) for providing support to TNT to trial electric vehicles in the territory," added Edward Lau, managing director of TNT Express Hong Kong.
"The transport sector can make a significant difference by adopting new technology to reduce carbon emissions and roadside air pollution. We hope that TNT's innovative initiative will inspire other companies to follow suit to do their part to improve Hong Kong's air quality," said an EPD statement.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
The US Coast Guard has published its latest rules on standards for living organisms in ballast water discharged in American waters, in which the old practice of exchanging of water mid-ocean will no longer be sufficient.
Instead, the US Coast Guard insists ships have shipboard water treatment systems that meet with the UN's International Maritime Organisation standards, which calls for the killing of living organisms to drastically reduce their number per cubic metre of water.
The US Coast Guard seeks to establish a standard for an acceptable concentration of living organisms in ballast water discharges, reports American Shipper, adding that the USCG is also revising regulations to include an approval process for ballast water management systems.
"Once fully implemented, this ballast water discharge standard will significantly reduce the risk of an introduction of aquatic nuisance species into the Great Lakes," said Rear Admiral Michael Parks, commander of the Ninth Coast Guard District in Cleveland.
The US Coast Guard said vessels entering the Great Lakes will still be required to fully exchange or flush their ballast tanks with seawater until they are equipped with the approved ballast water treatment systems that meet the discharge standard.
As for inbound foreign vessels, they will be examined at Montreal by a working group of US and Canadian authorities, including the US Coast Guard, to ensure the ballast tanks are exchanged or flushed as required, the report added.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
FINLAND's Cargotec has again won a contract from Volstad Maritime for two active heave-compensated (AHC) offshore cranes, after receiving a similar order from the privately-owned Norwegian specialist operator in April last year.
The two cranes, a 250-tonne MacGregor AHC sub-sea crane and a 15-tonne MacGregor AHC offshore crane, will be fitted to Volstad's new offshore construction vessel (OCV) on order at Bergen Group Fosen shipyard in Norway. The vessel (hull 90) is scheduled for delivery in August 2013, and following this, it will be chartered for sub-sea intervention services.
This contract follows a contract that was secured by Cargotec in April last year for Volstad's hull 89, which is due for delivery from the yard in July this year.
Like its sister ship, Volstad's latest OCV is an ST-259-CD design from Norwegian consultants, Skipsteknisk, and is 125 metres long and 25 metres wide. The vessel is designed to meet the highest environmental standards and Clean Design requirements. It will be classed to Ice-1A.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
PORT Metro Vancouver (PMV) is getting closer to realising its goal of building a new two million TEU terminal to cater for an expected boom in west coast volumes after it revealed that it expects to enter the project for environmental consideration and approval next year.
"The process can take four years and construction could start by the end of the decade with an opening by the early 2020s. We expect container trade to double for the west coast of Canada, tripling by 2030," port CEO Robin Silvester said, reports London's Containerisation International.
Drivers are Canada's population spurt and continuing export growth to Asia, resulting in expectation that cargo volumes will increase four per cent a year over the medium term.
But Mr Silvester said that the first focus of the port had been maximising existing capacity and de-bottlenecking the railroad facilities to cope with volume growth.
Nevertheless, the planned new terminal - dubbed Terminal 2 - has many environmental considerations attached to it due to the environmentally sensitive nature of the area where it is due to be built.
Notwithstanding these hurdles Mr Silvester said that he was confident that the process would be approved, as the port had done remedial and environmental mitigation work for previous port projects and was working closely with environmental groups.
The port expects overall cargo volume to grow four per cent this year compared to last year when laden volumes climbed two per cent to 2.2 million TEU, with loaded inbound rising one per cent to 1.2 million TEU, and full exports jumped four per cent to 999,725 TEU.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
THE UN's International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) has outlined mechanisms that could form an alternative to the controversial European Union carbon tax scheme following the principle of "common, but differentiated responsibility," on the basis of richer countries paying more.
Trouble is, ICAO must find a way to reconcile the richer-pays-more principle with its own governing Chicago Convention that insists on "non-discrimination" between member states.
Montreal-based ICAO has directed a working group to continue studying the four options and report back in June. During the initial negotiation, representatives from the US, China, Russia and EU countries reached an agreement about the ICAO's suggestion.
Deputy Secretary General of China Air Transport Association, Chai Haibo believe that China's civil aviation authorities will actively participate in international negotiations within the ICAO framework.
Chinese civil aviation industry experts are stepping up the details of these alternative mechanisms for emergency studies to determine which option is more favourable to China, providing a reference for relevant government departments.
Said ICAO council president Roberto Kobeh Gonzalez: "Seeking a global mechanism to solve the problem of aviation carbon emissions is very difficult and complicated, in part because developing countries are more concerned about its impact on the economy."
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
HONG KONG International Airport (HKIA) has posted an 18.6 per cent increase in February air cargo volume to 287,000 tonnes year on year, the airport authority announced.
"We must note that the gain is partly on account of the low base for comparison, as Chinese New Year fell in February in 2011, while this year it was in January," said HKIA chief executive Stanley Hui.
Looking at the two months together, HKIA has served a total of nine million passengers and handled 55,600 aircraft movements, registering increases of 7.5 per cent and 7.4 per cent respectively. Aggregate cargo volume declined 2.3 per cent, to 562,000 tonnes, when compared with the same two-month period last year.
HKIA's leading position as an air cargo centre has again been recognised recently. HKIA clinched Air Cargo World Magazine's "Air Cargo Award of Excellence" and achieved the highest overall rating in the category of "Airports Asia - 1,000,000 or more tonnes".
Voted by the magazine's readers, the awards recognise the performance, value, facilities and regulatory operations of airports in handling air cargo. HKIA has won the "Air Cargo Award of Excellence" seven times and secured the highest overall rating three times over the years.
The combined decline in cargo throughput for the first two months was mainly attributable to a seven per cent year-on-year drop in exports. Imports decreased two per cent while transshipments registered growth of two per cent compared to the same period last year.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
UPS has agreed to pay US$6.77 billion in cash to acquire TNT Express about one month after TNT Express shareholders rejected UPS' earlier offer of $6.4 billion.
The offer would create a per-share price of slightly less than $12.50. But the deal is subject to approval from European anti-trust regulators, reported Rosewell, Georgia's Air Cargo World.
"The combination of UPS and TNT Express will create a global leader in the logistics industry, with annual revenues of more than EUR45 billion [US$60 billion] and will deliver significant benefits for the shareowners, customers, employees and other stakeholders of both companies," said UPS.
The deal has been approved by the supervisory and executive boards of TNT Express and PostNL, with the latter agreeing to tender its 29.8 per cent stake to UPS.
The deal is expected to help UPS gain a bigger share of business outside the US as 36 per cent of total group revenues will be generated outside the US, up from UPS' current 26 per cent.
UPS said it will finance its offer with $3 billion in cash from its balance sheet and the remainder will come from new debt arrangements.
UPS expects its acquisition to boost profits in the first year and realise annual pretax cost savings of between $525 million and $725 million by the end of the fourth year after the deal is closed.
The combined company will control about 17.3 per cent of the European express market, placing it just behind Germany's DHL Express.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
THE latest operating results posted by China Southern Airlines show that the carrier moved 84,600 tonnes of cargo in February, up 41.2 per cent year on year, while its passenger throughput increased seven per cent to 6.39 million, Xinhua reports.
Domestic services recorded a cargo volume of 61,500 tonnes, increasing 43.4 per cent. Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan freight grew 31.8 per cent to 970 tonnes. International freight climbed 35.7 per cent to 22,100 tonnes.
On the passenger side, domestic lanes filled 5.76 million seats, up 6.6 per cent. Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan passengers dropped 2.6 per cent to 130,500. International services recorded 501,200 passengers, up 15.8 per cent. Seat utilisation fell 1.8 percentage points to 78.5 per cent.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
CARGO 2000 says it has fulfilled its promise to give the air cargo industry open access to its standard processes as part of it continuous initiative to improve quality management across the supply chain, reports Australia's Aircargo Asia Pacific journal.
Cargo 2000, part of the e-freight programme of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), marked the launch of the new initiative when its chairman, Mattijs ten Brink, handed over the modernised version of its Master Operating Plan (MOP) to IATA cargo chief Des Vertannes at the association's World Cargo Symposium in Kuala Lumpur.
Non-members of Cargo 2000 can now download the electronic version of the new MOP from the Cargo 2000 website and begin to map their own quality processes to the industry standard being adopted by the group's members, said the report. The MOP has been made available free of charge and is supported by information and quality reports.
"At the end of last year we made a commitment to give open access to the updated version of our MOP when it became available in the first quarter of 2012 and we have delivered as promised. The Master Operating Plan is the engine that sits behind the programme bring new levels of quality and efficiencies to the air cargo supply chain. The new MOP replaces the version first created in 1997 and it reflects the significant changes that have taken place in our industry since then," the chairman said.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
AIR China has posted its operating results in February. In this month, the carrier carried 76,400 tonnes of cargo, 18.3 per cent more than in the same month last year, and 4.2 per cent more than in January.
Its passenger volume increased 1.5 per cent year on year but fell 8.4 per cent month on month to 3.72 million seats sold.
On the cargo sector, capacity grew four per cent year on year. Turnover climbed 11.5 per cent. Load factor increased 3.4 percentage points to 50.5 per cent.
On the passenger sector, capacity grew four per cent. Turnover increased 2.3 per cent. Domestic service capacity increased 8.2 per cent, volume grew 3.4 per cent. International lanes capacity went 0.8 per cent up, turnover increased 1.1 per cent. Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan lanes capacity dropped 0.5 per cent, with actual volume dropping 4.5 per cent. Seat utilisation fell 2.1 percentage points to 77.3 per cent.
Source Shipping Gazette - Daily Shipping News
2012-03-20
Europe’s sixth biggest airline airberlin, along with its subsidiary airberlinNIKI, are welcomed into the oneworld global airline alliance today, March 20. Finnair and airberlin have cooperated on a code-share basis since 2010. The cooperation has opened up new destinations in German-speaking Europe and the Mediterranean for Finnair customers, and airberlin’s membership of the alliance will expand the network even further.
“Together with airberlin, Finnair will be able to serve its corporate and individual customers even better than before in the German-speaking central European home market as well as across Finnair’s extensive Asian network,” says Paavo Virkkunen, responsible for Finnair’s oneworld relations. “airberlin’s membership and commercial cooperation will deepen with the addition of codeshares and our mutual customers will gain better access to the international oneworld network.”
Following airberlin’s membership, the alliance network will extend to about 800 destinations in 150 countries. airberlin’s loyal customers will be able to earn points for flights taken on other alliance airlines, and vice versa.
Source Finnair Plc
PHILADELPHIA, Pa., USA, March 20, 2012 – BDP International, a leading global logistics and transportation provider, now offers a market-competitive solution for U.S. to Europe airfreight. Called BDP AirStar, the new gateway program expedites shipments from Chicago, New York and Houston to Amsterdam for immediate transit to all major destinations in Europe. BDP has entered into a multi-carrier partnership with KLM, Air France and Delta, providing a strong, flexible schedule and highly competitive rates.
“BDP AirStar delivers the fastest transit times at the best price with the right carrier to the right destination,” explained Gary Phelps, director of air freight services for BDP Americas. “Our clients are already realizing the benefits of regular, reliable schedules and lower costs, resulting from our increased buying power and the improved rates and transit times.”
The new air service allows BDP to designate a specific flight, such as KLM 612, departing Chicago at 4:30 p.m. and arriving in Amsterdam 07:30 a.m. the following morning. BDP collects the unit load device (ULD) and takes the freight to its airport facilities, combines it with other cargo from Asia, and delivers it to final destinations via its Amsterdam-based road feeder service. Under the terms of the agreement, BDP can move freight to other carriers when it reaches its allotted capacity with KLM.
A particular shipper benefit of the new program, according to BDP’s Phelps, is its weekend schedule of two cuts, the first an early Saturday morning flight arriving in Amsterdam Sunday and points beyond Monday; the second a Sunday flight arriving in Amsterdam Monday and points beyond Tuesday.
In addition, cargoes originating in Boston, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dallas, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Harrisburg, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. can be transported and combined with Chicago, Houston or New York ULDs, depending upon shippers’ trucking arrangements.
Coordinating the activities of these two gateways, BDP can divert cargoes destined for one gateway to the other, if one is at capacity or a shipper has just a single pallet. Using its web-based BDPSmart Vū tool, the company also can provide end-to-end supply chain visibility, tracking and tracing, and purchase order management.
BDP launched its initial enhanced air freight gateway program in 2011 on its Europe-Asia routes, offering three flights a week from Hong Kong (including Shenzen, Guangzhou and Xiamen), Shanghai and Taipei to major European hubs, including Frankfurt, Paris, Prague, Brussels, London, Hamburg, Munich, Vienna and Duesseldorf via Amsterdam. The addition of the U.S. gateways, according to Ulli Wrieden, BDP’s Frankfurt-based director of transportation for EMEA, will allow BDP to provide expanded and even more cost-efficient trucking options from Amsterdam.
Source BDP International
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